Review | Nosebleed at The Edge of The Wedge, Southsea: 'An intense sense of immediacy and camaraderie'

Seeing as this is punk trio Nosebleed’s farewell tour it seems likely that this is the only time I will get to experience them live.

This sharp-dressed (at the start of their set at least) Yorkshire-based three-piece are about to split as drummer Rich Myers – aka Dicky Riddims – is moving abroad.

From the off, it’s sharp, garage-rock with catchy songs flying by at a brisk clip. Half a dozen songs in and the blazers and ties have come off – with guitarist and vocalist Eliott Verity telling us: “It was 13 (degrees) when I left Leeds, and it were beautiful, but it's 21 here and I've been wet ever since!”

Not the most svelte of figures, he adds: “I'm going to get more naked, but I'm all about the body positivity,” to cheers from the throng.

Verity and bassist/vocalist Ben Hannah have soon abandoned the stage to set up shop in the middle of the venue’s floor, where they remain for the rest of the set. Effectively performing ‘in the round’ in the intimate confines of The Edge, it completely removes any boundaries and any sense of ‘them’ and ‘us’ that may typically exist between a band and their audience.

And Myers? He may be left alone on stage, but he soon has some of the audience members dancing up there to keep him company.

There’s an immediacy and sense of camaraderie that I’ve rarely seen created this intensely.

Much as I love the up-close and personal nature of gigs in The Edge, on this evidence Nosebleed could and should have ended up with bigger crowds than this.

They’re ably supported by two local acts – Freestone, a relatively new act comprising of scene veterans who get better every time I see them, and The Glorias, who as their penultimate singalong number states, are “Glorious” (na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na!). And there’s a nice nod to the sadly departed scene face Jim Cruttenden who they dedicate The Radio’s Playing Our Song to.

If there’s a Nosebleed reunion tour, they may not be booked for five nights at Wembley, but I’d wager that you’ll pay a lot less than £150 a ticket – and more importantly, you’d be a fool to miss out.